It took me two years to be back on top of Mont Blanc, after several summer attempts and one in the spring time when we had to bail due to poor conditions on the mountain. Once again September proves to be the perfect month to climb the Mont Blanc via the Gouter route, the temperature generally goes down to “normal”, so there’s almost no activity (read rock falls) on the  Grand Couloir of the Gouter ridge. Following a mountaineering week porogram, we got acclimatized climbing the south ridge of the Weissmies, a nice peak I’ve already talked a lot about on older posts, and we were pretty lucky to hit a perfect weather window on our summit day. This time we went up and down the same way, it’s a great plan for who’s not very familiar with rock scrambling, the terrain is pretty easy. Climbing the Weissmies up and down from the Allmagellerhutte is always recommended  when the conditions of the normal route from Hohsaas are not good (bare ice on the glacier and seracs activity).

Climbing the south ridge of the Weissmies.

On top of Mont Blanc with Steve.

If you plan to climb Mont Blanc on 3 days,  with one night at the Tete-Rousse and one at the Gouter Hut, then you have two “summit days”. That means you are totally flexible: you can take it easier on day2 and just climb up to the Gouter Hut from the Tete Rousse, and you have plenty of time to climb Mont Blanc and go back to Tete Rousse on the last day. If you have beautiful weather,  you can also leave the Tete Rousse at the first lights, like we did, and climb to the top of Mont Blanc with no stress, as your goal is to go back to the Gouter Hut for the night. We had a great summit day, it was so warm on top that I summited with my baseball cap and there was no need to wear gloves! On day 3, after breakfast, all we had to do was climbing down the Gouter ridge and hike down to the train at the Nid d’Aigle. A perfect mountaineering week and program!
Hi five to my Steve for digging deep and get up and down Mont Blanc safely, and also to John and Simon for the effort and the good time we had all together.

Climbing the normal route of Allalinhorn.

On top of the Alphubel.

In the gallery down here you can also see s0me pictures  from the traverse  Allalinhorn – Alphubel that I climbed on my day off in between the Weissmies and the Mont Blanc, better, while Simon John and Steve were having a rest before the summit push on Mont Blanc!
You can climb Allalinhorn and Alphubel in one day from Saas Fee, taking one of the first rides of the Allalin Metro train. The normal route on the Allalinhorn is nice and easy glacier stroll, “my first 4000 peak” like the Breithorn from Zermatt. If you’re keen to climb the Alphubel from the Allalinhorn, once you get back at the Feejoch you have to climb across the rocky ridge of the Feekopf, it’s an easy scramble on exposed terrain.  Once you go back on the glacier you can follow the easy route on the glacier to the top of the Alphubel, or climbing directly along the east ridge, also called Eisnase, depending on the conditions (the Eisnase features a short section of ice/hard snow up to 40 degree). From the top of Alphubel we walked straight down to Langflue, it’s pretty quick but recommended only if there’s already a good track, as the glacier is very crevassed and tricky. If you don’t know where to go…then it might get challenging.